8 lives

( dialogue prompts taken from episodes 1 & 2 ( "romance dawn" & "the man in the straw hat" ) of the netflix live action one piece series. feel free to edit and change as you seem fit. )

❛ do you have any last words? ❜

❛ the sea's been calling. well, not exactly calling, because i pretty much can't swim, but you get the idea. ❜

❛ so what do you say? are you with me? ❜

❛ liar! i know zoro must be after me. who else is worthy of his pursuit? ❜

❛ who's the most powerful pirate on the seas? ❜

❛ first things first. do you have any food here? ❜

❛ you don't look like a pirate. ❜

❛ i'm not afraid of getting hurt. and i'll prove it to you. ❜

❛ i don't get it. why would anyone want to be a pirate? ❜

❛ you have the wind on your back, the salty sea air, your loyal crew by your side. you never know what's on the horizon. it's all about being... free. ❜

❛ you should never let anyone tell you what you can't do. ❜

❛ well, remember the name, 'cause i'm gonna be king of the pirates. ❜

❛ people often visit shrines to light candles for those they've lost. who are yours for? ❜

❛ you've been following me for three days. what do you want? ❜

❛ look, i've been practicing what my face is gonna look like on my wanted poster.❜

❛ i've no doubt your mug will be on a wanted poster one day. ❜

❛ all he did was spill a drink on me. ❜

❛ you should've fought back! why didn't you kick his ass? ❜

❛ not everything can be solved with violence. a man needs to be strong, but he also needs to be good. ❜

❛ you're not a real man. you're nothing but a coward. ❜

❛ you ate a devil fruit? ❜

❛ ever since i was a kid, i wanted to protect people that can't protect themselves.❜

❛ if that's what you want, i think you should do it. i'll help you out. ❜

❛ my crew was attacked by pirates. i barely managed to make it out alive. ❜

❛ rice balls. for you. ❜

❛ you shouldn't draw your blade unless you're prepared to use it. ❜

❛ don't kill me, please. my father will give you anything you want. ❜

❛ i'd say you live up to your reputation. ❜

❛ what's up with the third sword? i mean, where does it even go? ❜

❛ what do you say, puppy? do you want to do a trick for me? sit up and beg. ❜

❛ i kill your kind for a living. ❜

❛ i mean it. i don't owe you anything. ❜

❛ you are going to get us both caught if you keep stomping around this place. ❜

❛ that was amazing. admit it. we do make a pretty good team. ❜

❛ so why did you decide to become a thief? ❜

❛ i needed to eat. you do what you have to, to survive. ❜

❛ you're right. nothing is more important than food. ❜

❛ all great fighters call out their finishing moves. ❜

❛ i don't work for you. ❜

❛ i'm sensing a little bit of tension amongst the crew. ❜

❛ before we met, every choice was made for me. but now i'm gonna do what i want to do. ❜

❛ next time we meet, we might be enemies. but for now... we're friends. ❜

❛ i'm feeling so... so piratey. ❜

❛ well, you're gonna end up feeling watery if i have to throw you overboard. i told you i need absolute silence. ❜

❛ don't mess with my hat. ❜

❛ oh, i'm sorry. were we interrupting your beauty sleep? ❜

❛ don't like what you see? look away. ❜

❛ you have a lot of names. i bet everyone in the east blue knows who you are. ❜

❛ are you making fun of my nose? ❜

❛ i know your type. if there's nothing to gain, you're out. ❜

❛ truthfully? i'm kind of hungry. ❜

❛ who are you trying to impress? a lost love? an absent parent? or was it someone that you worshipped? ❜

❛ i used to know a pirate that wore a hat just like this. ❜

❛ for a time, i even thought we were friends. until he betrayed me. just like all the others. ❜

❛ he wanted to keep me out of the spotlight! he wanted to keep my star from shining too brightly! ❜

❛ is that what he did to you? did he betray you, too? ❜

❛ you can slice me and you can dice me, but i'll always put myself back together again. ❜

❛ i've been thinking about you for years. ❜

❛ i know you're upset, but you should eat something. ❜

❛ you're never not hungry. what's going on? ❜

❛ you can spill a drink on me and i'll let it slide, but don't you ever threaten my friends. ❜

❛ you can't make people love you. just like you can't make them smile. ❜

❛ you really think anyone is coming for you? they don't care. and no one is gonna miss you when you're dead. ❜

❛ get lost. ❜

❛ i'm just glad that you're okay. ❜

❛ what was that? i couldn't hear you over all the drowning. ❜

❛ you really don't fear death, do you? ❜

❛ what's the plan? you do have a plan, right? that's your thing, plans. ❜

❛ you want out? you know the price you have to pay. ❜

❛ you want a piece of me? let's see what you got. ❜

❛ i think i'll miss you most of all. ❜

❛ we're gonna be the greatest pirates the world has ever seen. even greater than your crew. ❜

❛ this hat is the most precious thing i own. it means the world to me. and i want you to take it. ❜

❛ when we meet again, you can give it back to me. ❜

❛ is every day gonna be this crazy with you? ❜

That thought doesn't come to him until the other man has crossed the room silently. By now Bes can recognize the brief lapses in his boyfriend, when he's more in his head than outside it. The look of it isn't bizarre or worrying anymore. Most of the time it passes quickly and Bes has easily become used to waiting patiently for that. Just like now as he looks, waiting patiently for Areum to *see* him.

"Yeah... I've been wearing it so long I guess I didn't even think about bringing it up. Have you been looking for it?"

Laying his own hand over Areum's, the librarian looks down at the spot for a moment as he thinks about how it had just... slipped his mind. It seems weird now, but the ring has just become. ... a constant variable.

Yet it is the feline's attention that is quickly focused, drawn immediately by those small, heavy words.

Bes is always attentive when it comes to what Areum says and he reads deeply into every word. Sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse. Having first met young, they had learned each other in that sort of interim, between, not children but not quite adult, time. The sort of time when hiding a reaction wasn't yet mastered, emotions showing a little too clearly in expressions and feelings not yet hidden in sleeves sat there at the wrist. Bes could recall crying in Areum's arms, confessions over bottles of cheap alcohol they were too young to buy, and nights of staying up late like little kids with whispered secrets in poorly pitched forts made out of pillows and blankets.

Growing up changes a lot of things, but it can't change all the little ticks that make up the man in front of him. Hiding those things came with practice and time and dealing with the real world- they had both gotten better at it, sharing the experience despite the distance -but once you really see someone in all their candidness... it was impossible not to see through pretense. They know each other in that unfiltered way. So he knows the weight of those words, and he can feel the nervousness and the way Areum is drawing tight like string, wordlessly telling of their being on the cusp of something.

"I haven't tried it on in years, it's probably still too big. I doubt I'm going to grow into it."

Using their connected hands the feline begins to pull his boyfriend along with him from the open kitchen to the living room, walking backwards, gaze not leaving Areum's as he guides the space heater of a man towards the couch, sitting and tugging him down too. There is something that needs to be said, but Bes wants to help ease some of the tension he can sense building in the other's chest. Its like charge in the air- static that would have soft fur on end if it were tangible.

"Mhm?" Inari blinked and turned behind them to meet the eyes of one of the most adorable looking demigods the deity had seen on the island--sans their own children of course.

"Oh yes, quite all right, thank you for asking, sweet." Inari's smile was enough to alert anybody of their foxlike features and the look that followed was particularly cunning. "Now how come Ama-chan hasn't told me she has somebody as adorable as you working here?" Inari crosses the aisle in a few quick strides of their slim legs until they stood in front of the demigod, a few inches taller than them. "Aren't you just the cutest?"

"You know Amaterasu ?"

"Oh yes, as one can know her of course." The smile deepens. "My name is Inari, darling, now who would you be?"

It didn't escape the fox deity that the demigod seemed to react to her mention of Amaterasu's name. Inari decided against mentioning that ages ago the mention of the sun goddess would have struck fear instead of ease.

Recognition shows on Bes's face right away and it is followed by a respectful bow.

He could have guessed with a bit of time at least a relation to the Japanese fox deity- most prevalently -if not Aguara, Huixian, a Kumiho spirit, or.... potentially a feline deity if not a fox. Sekhmet? Nergal? Dawon? Mishipeshu? Not Bastest, though... He would have known in the way that he always seemed to know when encountering a sibling. -but the list of Gods and Goddesses came to mind naturally and, truthfully, could go on further. Countless hours had been devoted to sorting and cataloging material about a thousand different beings. Japanese mythos was a subject on which the feline had a wealth of knowledge- second only to Egyptian. Primarily because Bes too saw Amaterasu as a mother figure.

The demigod would never be brazen enough to utter the sentiment aloud.

An orphan and a ward of the council, from the moment he was capable of it the abandoned child was left to look after himself. As a place safe enough to drop him off, the library had become where most time was spent and in that way- a second home which saw him from early morning to the time the doors locked for the night. A bit unavoidably, Amaterasu also found herself a facet of Bes's life. Not for lack of his trying to be nonexistent. It had been instilled early in him to mind his manners and not be troublesome to the deities tasked with caring for him; to stay out from underfoot.

So even though he absolutely adored the goddess, he didn't dare claim to be of any special relation. Despite having always harbored the tiniest sliver of envy for those that did. Still, it isn't directed towards the deity; he's read more than enough to know about their connection and... in a way he can relate to it, too, having not been much more than a half drowned stray when he met Amaterasu. The thought has a soft smile coming to his lips that gives away his unspoken adoration.

"My name is Bes, I'm the senior librarian."

Even after years of spending hours upon hours among towering shelves, it was still often that Bes found himself lost in the maze they made. The library was not just a place that offered a wealth of knowledge, it was a safe haven; a second home to the orphan who had come to find love and comfort within worn pages rather than the arms of a mother or father.

He could recognize that same wonder on someone else, and so he couldn't even be upset when bumped into. This stranger had probably hurt himself more than he had inconvenienced Bes by knocking a few books from the cart, and the embarrassment on his face spoke volumes to the sincerity of his apologize.

"Its really not a problem."

His usual demeanor was lazy and casual, no annoyance or spite in his tone when he spoke, but he didn't begrudge the offer or the help as he kneeled down and began collecting books.

"Ah, yes—" He breathed out in relief, though a whisper of guilt still pulled at his heart at the same time the books weighed down in his arms. "It's my first time coming here, so I got a bit... overwhelmed. I was just curious to see everything, but I admit getting lost in here is quite easy." It was lovely, and not meant as an insult in the least. Having the privilege of losing himself in a building filled with shelves upon shelves of books was something he could've only dreamed of, and books about his kind, as well? Wondrous

"We have rooms."

There was an almost inconceivable wealth of written information pertaining to Gods and Goddesses. For centuries, they had captivated, and their stories and those inspired by them were too many to be contained to only a shelf or wall. They had thoughtfully been cataloged and housed in their own sections long before Bes ever wandered into this place. Still, the collections grew by an odd scroll or tablet through the years, transcribed for posterity, and carefully preserved by hands steadied with respect for the task, including even his own.

Bes was always more than pleased to take the demigods that came vying for answers and connection to those rooms.

"I can take you there. Is there anything or ..... anyone you are interested in?"

"Mhm?" Inari blinked and turned behind them to meet the eyes of one of the most adorable looking demigods the deity had seen on the island--sans their own children of course.

"Oh yes, quite all right, thank you for asking, sweet." Inari's smile was enough to alert anybody of their foxlike features and the look that followed was particularly cunning. "Now how come Ama-chan hasn't told me she has somebody as adorable as you working here?" Inari crosses the aisle in a few quick strides of their slim legs until they stood in front of the demigod, a few inches taller than them. "Aren't you just the cutest?"

"You know Amaterasu ?"

That thought doesn't come to him until the other man has crossed the room silently. By now Bes can recognize the brief lapses in his boyfriend, when he's more in his head than outside it. The look of it isn't bizarre or worrying anymore. Most of the time it passes quickly and Bes has easily become used to waiting patiently for that. Just like now as he looks, waiting patiently for Areum to *see* him.

"Yeah... I've been wearing it so long I guess I didn't even think about bringing it up. Have you been looking for it?"

Laying his own hand over Areum's, the librarian looks down at the spot for a moment as he thinks about how it had just... slipped his mind. It seems weird now, but the ring has just become. ... a constant variable.

(ू ੭•͈ω•͈)੭｡.ﾟ♡